Stanhope Primary School in South Shields has been using TrilbyTV as much more than a teaching aid in their school. It has been used as a tool to inspire their children to believe in themselves and the goals they want to achieve throughout life.

Set in a deprived part of the UK, Stanhope School has to work exceptionally hard to ensure each of their pupils:

· Has aspirational goals that they truly believe they can reach

· Understands that higher education isn’t closed off to them

· Considers a career in the professional world.

Trilby TVTrilbyTV is a simple to use video sharing app and online storage service that allows students to share video projects with each other and around their school, and has been used to encourage Stanhope School pupils to believe in their own ability and have confidence in themselves.

Recently, Sunderland University organised an aspirational day where they worked with Year 5 children in Stanhope School. They organised a number of activities to demonstrate to the pupils that higher education really is an option and not beyond their wildest dreams. TrilbyTV was used during the day to film activities and then shared across the school to encourage pupils throughout the whole school.

John Vasey, Headteacher of Stanhope Primary commented,

“This is an excellent demonstration of how we use TrilbyTV at Stanhope School. It has become an integral part of our curriculum and the teachers and pupils have embraced it with open arms. It’s so incredibly simple to use and so much fun – we all love it. It brings our school to life.”

In the past, any videos produced by the children have remained with their particular class. What TrilbyTV allows, is for pupils’ successes to be shared across the whole school. This has stimulated the younger children who are now really excited about moving up through the school as they can physically see the type of exciting projects they will be involved in as they get older.

John continued,

“We honestly believe this will ease the transition for pupils moving from the infants to the juniors, and rather than feel anxious and nervous about the move, they’re excited by the challenges to come.”

It’s not just the pupils who have been thrilled by what TrilbyTV can do, the parents have been extremely impressed too. Where they would usually sit with their backs to a blank screen whilst waiting to greet their children as they come out of school at the end of the day, they now watch the videos produced by their children. This has created a genuine interest in what their children are doing in the classroom and resulted in parents becoming more engaged with each other as well as with the teachers. In some cases it has even helped to break the ice during parents’ evenings.

The school uses TrilbyTV across all areas of the curriculum, and throughout the whole school, from reception children through to the top of the juniors. John believes one of the reasons TrilbyTV has been such a success is the simplicity of it.

John continued,

“Time is the most valuable commodity for a teacher, so any technology which is used in the school must be fast and simple. That is exactly what TrilbyTV is. The teachers love it – it doesn’t matter if they haven’t used it for a few months, it’s so intuitive and straightforward that we can create, upload and share videos very quickly and easily. Once the children have created a video, it is moderated by the teacher and then goes live on the screens for all to view. Staff really value it as a way to bring their subjects to life and enthuse even the most reluctant of pupils to get involved.”

The school is currently running sixteen videos on a loop including an African project, a literacy project, a sports project and creative projects, on a screen in the school and another in the entrance area for parents to view. The school believes it will produce around twenty-four videos each year across all areas of the curriculum and throughout the whole school. Storage isn’t a concern as TrilbyTV stores all the videos securely on a UK cloud based server.

John concluded,

“TrilbyTV has become a core part of our teaching environment. It is tremendous to see the children so excited about the work they are doing. To see their work on screen is delightful. As far as they are concerned they are on TV and it may as well be the BBC! The excitement and confidence it creates is incredible!”

Take a look at www.trilbytv.co.uk and see how you could integrate this simple, yet powerful solution into your school, giving you another tool with which to inspire your students. Alternatively, contact John Vasey at Stanhope Primary School for a further insight into his school’s experience of TrilbyTV on 0191 420 17100191 420 1710.

This article first appeared in Digital Education, the free newsletter for those with a professional interest in educational ICT and Computing. To sign up, please complete the short form on our newsletter page. We use a double opt-in system, and you won’t get spammed.